


take care

by lavenderhaze



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Multi, Sick Character, don't be like na jaemin kids, good thing he has a gaggle of boyfriends to do it for him, jaemin is incapable of taking care of himself
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-10
Updated: 2020-10-10
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:20:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,763
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26928802
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lavenderhaze/pseuds/lavenderhaze
Summary: His mother says he takes after her delicate sensibilities. His dad thinks maybe he didn’t get all the right vaccinations as a child. Whatever the reason, every year like clockwork, Jaemin will find himself afflicted with illness as the weather get colder.
Relationships: Huang Ren Jun/Lee Donghyuck | Haechan/Lee Jeno/Na Jaemin
Comments: 14
Kudos: 79





	take care

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by a Tumblr textpost I found screenshotted on Instagram, which I then tweeted about on Twitter [here](https://twitter.com/00drippin/status/1314585675241529344?s=20). 
> 
> This is technically a 00s ot4 fic, but please note Jeno doesn't actually show up, he's just mentioned. Sorry!

Jaemin is straight up not having a good time in his flesh prison.

His mother says he takes after her _delicate sensibilities_. His dad thinks maybe he didn’t get all the right vaccinations as a child. Whatever the reason, every year like clockwork, Jaemin will find himself afflicted with illness as the weather gets colder.

It probably didn’t help at all that he had been too busy with three weeks of exams and presentations and papers to worry about trivial things like _health_. So what if he had been sleeping maximum five hours a night? And if he had started sniffling every now and then, what was he supposed to do about it? 

Jaemin is a _hustler_ and a _fighter_ and a _chronic perfectionist_ —he will get his straight A’s even if it kills him.

Of course, his last exam had to be scheduled for the very last timeslot on the very last day of the exam period, and of course, it had to be four hours long so he only finished by 10 pm. Of course, because the exam ended so late the day busses that leave every 15 minutes had stopped running, so he had to wait nearly an hour for the night bus, which then, of course, took a longer route and dropped him off at his stop twenty minutes later than usual. 

By the time he made it through the door of his apartment, it had been pushing midnight. He didn’t even bother to wash up, just tugged off his shoes and collapsed face-first on top of his bed. 

He wakes up the first time with the sun in his face and an overwhelming chill in his everything. He is shivering so hard his teeth clack. 

He pulls himself up and fumbles for his phone, which tells him it’s just past seven in the morning. _Fuck no_ ; he has about a week’s worth of sleeping to make up for, and also he is fucking freezing. 

He has enough mind to tug his crusty jeans and shirt off before properly burrowing under his blankets and knocking back out.

The second time he wakes up, it’s to the incessant noise of his phone ringing. He blindly smacks his hand around until he lands on it and pokes at the screen, hoping he had hit the reject call button.

“Jaeminnie, we’re at the door!” Renjun’s perky voice says from the speakers. No dice on that reject then.

“You can fuck right off and let me sleep,” Jaemin says. Or, he _tries_ to say—it mostly comes out sounding like _yukufukryeoffnlemmesli_.

“Oh, did you just wake up?” Renjun’s voice suddenly drops low.

A loud banging drowns out any response Jaemin could have made.

“Open up, fucknugget!” 

Jaemin groans into his pillow. If anything his 8-year friendship-turned-romance with Donghyuck has taught him, it’s that he will not be turned away once he’s made up his mind. Either Jaemin sucks it up and lets him in, or he’ll be paying for a new door after Donghyuck breaks it down.

Still feeling way, _way_ too cold, he bundles his duvet around himself and drags himself off the bed, padding over to the door and unlocking it. He doesn’t have the energy to greet them properly, just turns back around and collapses on the nearest soft surface—his couch.

“You’re finally free!” Donghyuck yells, Renjun laughing behind him as they enter. “What time did you finish last night? How are you still asleep at two in the afternoon?”

Jaemin figures the questions are rhetorical; he stays silent and hopes he can still fall back asleep.

“We brought some groceries for you since you probably don’t have anything in your fridge. Also Jeno is on his way, he said he wanted to hit the gym first,” Donghyuck steamrolls on. Jaemin vaguely recognises the sounds of him moving through the kitchen. 

A shadow falls across his face, and he feels someone—Renjun, it has to be Renjun—kneel in front of him, before gasping loudly.

“Jaemin, are you sick?” Renjun asks, before he feels a hand fall on his forehead. “Shit, Hyuck, he’s burning up.”

Oh, that would probably explain why he's so cold, despite it only being early October. 

“Wait, what?” Jaemin hears a cupboard slam shut, and then Donghyuck is in front of him too. “Fuck, he really doesn’t look so good. _Fuck_ , what if he’s unconscious?”

Even through the haze, Jaemin registers the panic in Donghyuck’s voice. That’s weird. Donghyuck doesn’t panic.

He cracks his eyes open, blearily looks them in what he hopes are their eyes—they mostly look like brown blobs.

“I’m not uncon—” he starts, before breaking off into a fit of coughing that has him curling into a ball. Donghyuck and Renjun jump back, making similar noises of disgust.

Jaemin slumps back once the fit has passed, somehow feeling even more exhausted than he already was. “I take it back, I am absolutely unconscious.”

Donghyuck lets out a world-weary sigh, before bundling Jaemin up in his blanket and pulling him to his feet. Jaemin lets out an involuntary whine at having to be vertical.

“Renjun, can you ask Jeno to pick up some ibuprofen on the way here? I’ll put this one to bed, maybe consider not asphyxiating him with his own pillows for not taking care of himself properly.”

“Don’t be mean to me, I’m sick.” Jaemin pouts, but it goes ignored by both of his boyfriends. 

“Should I ask him to bring some takeout too?” 

“Mm, maybe some real chicken soup. Also orange juice, he needs vitamin C,” Donghyuck calls back as they enter Jaemin’s bedroom. He unceremoniously dumps Jaemin onto the mattress and goes to draw the curtains. Jaemin crawls blindly until he finds his pillow, then promptly shoves his face into it.

“You’re so fucking stupid, you _know_ this is flu season. When was the last time you ate proper food?”

“But my grades,” Jaemin feebly protests.

“Your grades aren’t worth you being sick, dipshit,” Donghyuck snaps. The genuine frustration in his voice makes Jaemin tense; Donghyuck rarely gets this serious about anything ever. Jaemin cracks his eyes open and takes a proper look at his boyfriend for the first time.

He looks angry, brows furrowed and shoulders tense. But, more than that, Jaemin is surprised to see that the look in Donghyuck’s eyes is _fear_.

He pushes himself up, sitting back against his headboard, and makes grabby hands for Donghyuck, who rolls his eyes but comes to hold his hand anyway. Jaemin tugs with what little strength he has, until Donghyuck is seated on top of him.

“I’m fine, Hyuck. You’ve seen me get sick like this every year.” 

Donghyuck’s eyes flutter shut, forehead falling so it’s pressed against Jaemin’s. “This is the first time I can’t see you everyday, asshole. I’m not your babysitter, I can’t always be around to make sure you’re taking care of yourself.”

And, oh, that’s a wake-up call. 

Jaemin and Donghyuck are both fiercely independent people, always have been. There was a time in senior year when they struggled with making a decision about going to the same university or not, both being desperately in love with each other but also wondering if they would be losing something by constantly sticking too close. In the end, they found a college where their campuses would be in the same city but far away enough from each other that they can have their own lives.

Jaemin misses Donghyuck when he’s not around, but he figured he was coping alright without him. He’s getting the same grades he did in high school, keeping up with as many extracurriculars and volunteering jobs. He hadn’t realised that maybe his health had been slipping up more than it used to, and that maybe it’s because he didn’t have Donghyuck to take care of him.

Jeno does what he can, since they go to the same campus, but he has his football and his gaming club and his own classes to study for. Also, Jaemin loves the boy but he really can’t cook for shit. 

Renjun, slightly more capable than Jeno after years of taking care of his little cousins, checks in on him now and then, but he lives too far to do it regularly enough, and he doesn’t have the same years of experience dealing with a stubborn, overworked Jaemin as the other two.

It’s a startling realisation that Donghyuck had always been there to look after him, and that this was the first semester since they met in 6th grade that Donghyuck _isn’t_. 

When they were in middle school together and had all the same classes, he would leave snacks at Jaemin’s elbow, and forced him to go on bubble tea runs when he decided they had spent too much time in the library. 

In high school, even when they were busier and only had two classes together—not even a lunch period—Donghyuck had made sure to memorise Jaemin’s schedule so he always knew which classroom he needed to drop off an extra set of lunch for Jaemin at. He had always demanded he and Jeno study at Jaemin’s house, which Jaemin had assumed was because of the pool in his backyard. It isn’t until now that he wonders if maybe the fact that he also went to sleep by midnight after those study sessions, thanks to Donghyuck’s complaining and Jeno’s manhandling, wasn’t such a coincidence after all.

He swallows around a lump in his throat. “Hyuck.”

Renjun swings the bedroom door open, carrying a tray with a plate of bread and a bowl of something steaming. Donghyuck shuffles backwards and settles at Jaemin’s feet.

“Tomato soup and toast,” he announces, placing the tray in Jaemin’s lap before settling at his side. “You will eat it all so you can actually take the ibuprofen when Jeno gets here, then you will sleep some more, and we will be the best boyfriends ever and clean your house for you, and make you dinner, and not leave this apartment until you’re feeling better.”

The words are unbearably sweet; the way Renjun makes them sound like a threat is actually impressive.

He sniffles again, and pretends it's because of his cold and not the tears pricking his eyes. “I love you all so much.” 

Renjun slides a hand through his hair, even though it’s knotted and greasy and limp, and Jaemin has to blink furiously before he does something stupid like cry.

“I know,” Renjun says with a gentle smile. “Now shut up and drink your soup.”

**Author's Note:**

> This was my first ever NCT fic (even though I've stanned for the last four years, quarantine is really doing things to me) !! i'd love to hear your comments/criticism 🥺🥺🥺
> 
> [twt](https://twitter.com/00drippin)


End file.
